Moonlight and Musings
by AlliBeth
Summary: Spoilers for season six. Just a conversation between Lisbon and Jane after Pike's offer.
1. Chapter 1

Teresa Lisbon walked, as though on auto-pilot, through the dark office, making it to her desk without tripping or otherwise injuring herself.

As she sat in her chair, she let out a shuddering breath she didn't know she'd been holding.

"Early night?"

The unexpected voice, coming from nowhere, almost had her hitting the ceiling as she jumped in her seat, turning slightly to see blond curls glowing in the light of the moon from the window behind her.

"Jesus, Jane! Are you trying to give me a heart attack?" she turned away from him quickly, swiping at her eyes, hoping he hadn't seen that she was teary.

"Me giving you a heart attack? Me? Please, woman. Unless I misunderstand the situation, once again I'm napping and you've woken me up," he grumbled, "And just by the way, you take your Lord's name in vain a hell of a lot for a good Catholic girl. Sister Mary Margaret would not be impressed."

When she didn't take his bait, Jane frowned and moved a little closer. "What are you doing here?" he questioned, "I thought you were out with our fine Agent Pike."

"Don't start…."

Jane shook his head, "I'm not starting. I'm just wondering what has you so upset that instead of spending the rest of the evening with Pike, you're sitting in here in the dark, hoping I won't notice you've been crying."

"Jane…" she warned.

"I'm sorry," he replied softly. "I'm just worried about you. I want you to be happy. You don't seem happy."

Tentatively, Lisbon moved from her seat and sat at the opposite end of Jane's couch.

"Do you ever miss the way things were?" she asked him. "Not Red John," she hastened to add, "our team at the CBI. Just the five of us."

"I do," Jane admitted. "But we know Grace and Rigsby are happy, Cho is still around to give people death-glares, and you're still my partner, right?"

Lisbon nodded. "I miss the way we were a family, though. I feel like everything is falling apart."

"We're still family," Jane insisted. "Always will be."

"I don't know…" Lisbon shuffled a bit closer to him on the couch. "Cho's impressing all the right people and will probably have a team of his own before we know it, Wayne and Grace are so far away we hardly see them…"

"So it's you and me against the world," Jane joked. "We can handle that."

"Is it though?"

"You mean Pike?"

"Yes…. no… I don't know. Even if Marcus wasn't around, things have changed. We've changed."

Jane shook his head, "Nothing has changed. I will always be here for you, you know that."

She nodded and let out a frustrated laugh, "When did life get so complicated?"

"And again, I think we're talking about Agent Pike," Jane said gently.

Lisbon was silent for a moment, before deciding to get things out in the open. "If I tell you something will you promise not to overreact or get upset?"

"I can try…"

"Okay… He's asked me to move to DC with him."

Lisbon flinched, waiting for the inevitable Jane outburst and was stunned when it didn't come.

"Jane?"

When he finally turned to look at her, she could see that he now looked teary. "So it's more serious than any of us thought, obviously."

"Yes… I mean no. I don't know. For him it is. For me… I'm not sure."

Jane took a breath. "Do you want to go?"

"I don't know.. I panicked when he asked me. I had no idea what to say. I told him I'd think about it and said we should probably have an early night."

"Okay."

"I don't know what to do, Jane," she continued. "I really like him, but is that enough to just up and move states for someone? I don't want to hurt him, but I don't know if I want to start over in a whole new city either. I just found you and Cho again.. we're making lives for ourselves here…"

"The Three Musketeers," Jane murmured. "Do you love him?" he asked the question dreading the answer.

"Like I said, I like him a lot. I could probably get there, but right now… not the way he needs me to," she admitted.

"So I'm still number one on your speed dial?" Jane inquired, trying to make light of the situation.

"If you weren't you'd have Wiley hack my phone to put you back there, so why bother taking you off it?" Lisbon smirked.

"Well played, Agent Lisbon. Well played."

"I've missed you these last couple of months," Lisbon admitted, glancing at him briefly to gauge his response.

"Not as much as I've missed you, partner," Jane reached over for her hand, linking their fingers.

They settled into silence for a few moment, soaking in the quiet of the FBI at this late hour.

"What should I do?" Lisbon asked finally.

"You will do what's right. You always do," Jane replied. "I would be lost without you and miss you every moment of every day, just like I did on the island, but it's your decision. You need to do what's right for you. I can see it from Pike's point of view. You're smart, you're kind, you're beautiful… how could he not love you?"

She wanted to ask him, 'if I'm all that, how could you not, then? How could you say it and then take it back?' but restrained herself. He had to know that one word, one sign from him and she would drop poor Agent Pike like a hot potato. She would take this damaged soul over the perfect Pike any day.

Lisbon was dragged from her thoughts by a tug on her hand as Jane rose from the couch.

"Since you got back so early, I assume there was no dessert?"

"Not even a mouthful…."

"Well, you're in luck then, because I haven't had dessert either, and Fischer introduced us to a fine diner that has a pretty good apple pie," Jane grabbed her free hand with his, and pulled her up on her feet to stand in front of him.

Lisbon closed the distance between them, giving him a quick hug.

"Thank you," she said softly when she stepped back, avoiding his gaze.

"For taking you out for pie?"

"For not making a fuss about tonight. For not making me feel bad…. because I feel bad enough right now without any help."

"Well, we'll have to fix that," Jane gave her a smile and offered her his arm. "Come on, pie awaits."

Lisbon linked her arm in his, turning in the direction of the door.

"You know, I think I'd rather have ice-cream…."

"We always have ice-cream.."

"No we don't…"

"Seriously woman," Jane sighed dramatically, "if I didn't know better, I'd think I needed to stage an intervention. We could get Cho involved, he could look at you disapprovingly every time you had a spoonful. He was good at that with Rigsby"

"Fine," Lisbon replied. "Have your pie, I'll have a sundae."

"Oh, no you don't. You know that I have pie you'll want that instead of your ice-cream, we're splitting a sundae…"

Lisbon smiled to herself, gripping Jane's arm a little tighter. She had missed this. She had missed him. She thought the time she had spent with Pike would have dulled her feelings towards him. It hadn't.

The decision about DC just got a lot harder.


	2. Chapter 2

"Fix this, or I'll break your nose."

Jane looked up from his book, curious, finding Cho standing in front of the couch - an immovable force with arms folded and a frown that would scare the devil himself directed right at him.

"What is it that I need to fix that has you threatening bodily harm?" he inquired.

"I'm sure you'll figure it out. Whatever it is, fix it."

Jane frowned now, "So you're threatening to break my nose for something, but you don't know what that something is?"

"Pretty much."

The blond mentalist shifted in his seat, "Let me get this straight. You think I did something, and I'm supposed to figure out what that something is."

"It's simple. I saw Lisbon this morning. She looked like she'd been crying. I'm pretty sure you're to blame.'

Jane scoffed at him. "And how do you figure that?"

Cho gave a miniscule shrug. "You nearly drown, she cries. You lose your memory, she cries. You get your memory back and re-live your family dying, she cries. You disappear for months on end, she cries. You come back, she cries. You let on that you slept with Lorelei - that was a big one - she cries. You you disappear again….."

"Okay, I get the picture. But for the record, I did nothing wrong. We went for ice cream last night."

"I know you did something."

"Nope."

Cho eyed him suspiciously. "I know you did something," he repeated pointedly.

Jane rolled his eyes. "Okay, Mr Nosy. During the last week, I bought her coffee three times, I let her drive without whining about wanting my turn, I found a shop that makes the most excellent bear claws and bought her a couple, I told her she looked beautiful before her date with Pike the other night, and I bought her ice-cream. Not seeing a problem there."

"Huh." Cho looked perplexed. "Well something's upset her."

When Jane didn't reply, Cho's suspicion rose.

"You know."

"What do I know?" Jane asked frustratedly.

"You know what's upsetting her."

"Maybe I do," Jane murmured mysteriously.

"Spit it out."

"No."

"Spit it out, or I'll break your nose."

"So bossy," Jane whined. "How did Rigsby put up with you all those years?"

"Jane, I want to know what's upsetting her so we can fix it," Cho explained slowly.

Jane huffed, "Fine, but you can't tell anyone or I'll be the one breaking your nose!"

At Cho's raised eyebrow, he amended his statement "Fine, I'll get Fischer to break your nose. Does that scare you? Just sit."

Cho lowered himself onto the couch next to Jane, totally unprepared for what came next.

"Pike's asked her to move to DC with him."

"He what?" Cho's reaction was almost angry, as he raised off the couch in shock. It was the kind of reaction Lisbon might have expected from Jane, not from the man who had been her trusty 2IC all those years in Sacramento.

"You heard."

Cho shook his head, and Jane was almost amused at the display of emotion on the face of such a normally impassive man. "Is she going?"

"She hasn't decided yet," Jane admitted with a frown.

"Fix this."

"I thought you liked Pike," Jane eyed Cho curiously.

"I do. He's nice, dependable, loyal. An all-round good guy. She'll be bored to death in no time, and she'll blame herself when they split, so" he spoke slowly, as though to a child. "you need to fix this."

"She hasn't made a decision," Jane insisted. "There's nothing to fix."

"Ever heard of preventative measures?"

"What do you want me to do?" Jane was getting seriously frustrated at this point, never having heard Cho so talkative or insistent.

"Talk to her. Tell her the truth for once in your life," Cho responded. "She's upset because she's looking for an out. She's looking for a reason not to go. You're not giving her that."

"Why does it have to me me?"

Cho actually smacked him over his right ear for that. "Jane, don't play dumb. I'm not in the mood. You know the drill. She loves you. You love her. Pike is her distraction from the fact that you're an infantile, non-committal jerk. Fix. This."

With that, Cho got up and walked away, shaking his head as he went.

Jane whined to himself, rubbing his right ear. For a quick slap, that was actually pretty sharp.

"Hey Jane."

He turned, taking in the vision of Lisbon before him, still rubbing his ear.

She frowned. "What happened?" she asked, coming over, gently pushing his arm out of the way and running a hand over his head.

Jane gave her his best lost-boy pout, "Cho hit me," he whined.

Lisbon sighed and shook her head.

"What did you do this time?"

Jane sank back into his couch, "I give up," he muttered under his breath.


End file.
